Touring Performance and Global Exchange 1850-1960: Making Tracks

This collection explores the connections and coincidences between pioneering performers who crossed the Atlantic and Pacific oceans from the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century, challenging the old stories of their journeys. It investigates songlines, drama, opera, music theatre, dance, and circus, celebrating difference and transformation in style, intention, and delivery. It demonstrates that moving performance transforms repertoires and people, and maps different patterns of global exchange.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 276 pages
Publication date: 29 January 2024
Publisher: Taylor & Francis Ltd

This captivating collection delves into the intricate web of connections and remarkable coincidences that challenge the traditional narratives of pioneering performers who traversed the vast Atlantic and Pacific oceans from the mid-nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century. It explores a diverse range of performance genres, including songlines, drama, opera, music theatre, dance, and circus, dismantling the traditional boundaries that separate studies of performance. Instead, it celebrates the rich diversity and transformative power of style, intention, and delivery.

Well-known and obscure traveling performers embarked on perilous sea voyages and arduous land journeys in pursuit of fortune and fame. Their paths intertwined with those of earlier storytellers, who were also on quests for sustenance. Touring Performance and Global Exchange offers a fresh perspective on these trails, revealing that moving performance goes beyond the mere transfer of repertoires and people; it profoundly transforms them.

Traditionally, touring performance has been perceived in diasporic terms, as a fixed product emanating from a cultural center. This collection, however, maps out diverse patterns that encompass reversed flows, cross currents, and the continual proliferation of centers of meaning within complex networks of global exchange.

This collection holds immense appeal to scholars and students in the fields of theatre, music, drama studies, and cultural history. It provides valuable insights into the intricate relationships between performance, migration, and the broader socio-cultural dynamics of the time, shedding light on the ways in which artistic expression traversed borders and fostered cultural exchange.

Weight: 453g
Dimension: 234 x 156 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9780367519667